Parallel Universes

Sometimes I feel like I’m living in a parallel universe…by that I mean that there are times when I’ll see something or read something or hear of something that makes me think, “No, that’s not right, not in the world I live in.” Usually though, it is in fact my world. Also common is that I’m the only person affected by these moments. Everyone else seems to take them in stride while I’m silently contemplating the existence of the world…Here are three examples from the last 24 hours (please note, I don’t usually have this many in one day, that’s why I’m posting about it):

1. DUI Insurance: I passed a cab yesterday that had a huge sticker advertising “Lower rates for DUI’s!” I wasn’t sure if this was a ploy to get drunk people to think they are getting a good deal with this particular cab (Hey, I won’t get another DUI and maybe they’ll save me some money) or if the cab was just doing that poorly that it had to take on advertisers peddling to a market that shouldn’t be on the road anyway.

2. Reading this article (thanks Erin for posting it) that says, among other things: Hate group membership had been expanding steadily over the course of the past decade — fueled largely by anti-immigrant sentiment. But after Barack Obama’s election, it spiked. The day after the election, the computer servers of two major white supremacist groups crashed, because their traffic went through the roof….Sigh. How do we live in such a hateful world? I just don’t understand it.

3. Brian sent this image, which looked frighteningly familiar: